DEEP COUNTRY

To assert that our Woodstock house is in le pays profonde (French) or the inaka (Japanese) is but a slight exaggeration.  Both foreign phrases translate as the ‘deep countryside’ and seem more apropos than their English equivalents.  The house is almost exactly 100 miles (125 kilometers) north of New York City, about a two-hour drive in normal conditions.  The distance from either the city or the traffic-light-less village of Woodstock is in the Goldilocks zone:  just right.  The last 100 meters of the road to the home are unpaved, and there is only one house beyond ours.  The three acres go mushy/swampy in the back.  My fantasy of building a Japanese-style tea house in a high Kyoto style behind the home is on hold.  In all honesty, ‘hold’ is a dubious and suspect word choice, but it was the preference of a one-time public diplomatist; the structure may never come to fruition.

         After short occupancies by gentlemen of a certain age, my wife and I have been the primary denizens for about a decade, supplemented by occasional dollops of family and friends.  The architecture is dull and undistinguished.  Except for a painstaking and precise imitation of a Japanese torii gate by a local craftsman who has dubbed himself The Chainsaw Poet.  We offered input; he provided inspiration.  The gate is magnificent and memorable.  Unfortunately, it stands seven feet (over two meters) tall between the house and the shed and offers a fine vista of the woods.  Our torii reminds me just enough of Kyoto (I once lived about 90 minutes away by train), but it does not ratchet up the nostalgia meter.  Until proven otherwise, I will claim that our torii gate is unique – as a work of art – in Woodstock.

         In my mid-70s, I move slowly both in my neuropathy-plagued gait and in my writing.  I hope that the extensive slow to ripen introduction will suffice to seduce you into reading about my real subject.  In le pays profonde, we are outnumbered by the animals, both mammals and insects.  Deer play cache-cache (hide and go seek) on each side of the house.  They graze on our grass and, likely sample the parsley, tarragon and other herbs that my wife tries to grow in pots on the back deck.  She made a noble effort this fall to place chrysanthemum in pots outside the front door.  The deer agreed 100% with this gesture but made short work of the lively flowers.  They engage in occasional staring contests before moving on.  We drive with caution, especially at twilight, to avoid the deer on our short unpaved road or the larger asphalted ones.

         According to the Oriental zodiac, both my wife and I were born in the year of the rabbit.   We see a bunny bound in and out of the bushes; we have never spotted babies.  We display an inordinate number of rabbit tsochkes – cups and plates and cutesies – in the house.  Like the deer, the rabbits have gained a special place in our hearts.

         Ditto for the fireflies who light up the nights for at least one summer week.

         But the biggest animal that we have seen, the bear, is not a welcome denizen of our woods.  One spring morning a black bear loomed outside our living room window, then lumbered on.  We made note of his presence but chose not to engage.